Buttless knitting-machine needle



' w. FELS. BEUTTLESS KNITTING MACHINE NEEDLE. AP ED FEB. 3| 1919.

Patented Sept. 28, 1920.

L fr m l /lfl/ l M ZZ t9-g J/VVENTOR y s y I' A E L mrow@ PATENTorifice.

WILLAM EELS, OF ELIZABETH, NEW JERSEY, ASSIGNOR TO MAX NYDEGGER, OFELIZABETH; NIE- JERSEY.

kBUlTllflEfSS` KNITTING-MACHINE NEEDLE.

assignee.

. Specification of Letters Patent.

Patented Sept. 28, l1920.

Application filed Februar-y 3, 1919. Serial No. 274,607.

ing buttless needles, it has been found that some needles of the set arefrequently tilted from their normal operative vertical position in ,theneedle guiding slots and become jammed between a wall of the slot and aportion of a needle actuating jack. Also, it often happens that the jackfails to engage the needle by reason of its being tilted out of normalposition, thus .interfering with. the continuous fabrication of the ar-.f

ticle being knitted in the machine.

Une object of the present invention is to provide a needle which may beretained in operative position in the slot without the use of specialguiding members, the shank and hook portions of such a needle beingproportioned with respect to the needle guiding slot in such a mannerthat the hooks may perform substantially their normal function as wellas the function ordinarily performed by guiding means, as butts or otherguiding projections.

An embodiment of my invention is illus- `ti'ated in the drawingsaccompanying the present specification and in which,

Figure l, is a transversel vertical section through the needle beds,

Fig-j2, a plan view of a portionl of said needle/beds, and

Figs. 3 and et, details illustrating the construction of a portion ofone form of needle.

As shown in Figs, l and 2, a needle 1 may be positioned to run in a slot2 of a needle bed 3, said slot registering with a similar slot-t in aneedle bed 5.

ingfone hook 7 of the needle and also by a jacl 8 engaging the otherhook 9 of said needle, the jacks being operated by yany Such a needlemay beactuated by means of a jack 6 engagin the case of circularmachines, revolving cams Iwhich are not shown.

As more clearly shown in Fig. 3, the hook portions of needle l extendbeyond the plane of all upper surfaces of the shank portion. Fig. 4shows a hook portion 7 having substantially the same width as the shankportion. Referring again to Figs. 1I and 2, it will be noted that in thestructure there shown, the slots 2 are separated by suitable partitionsl and-the slots Ll by similar partitions ll. As illustrated in Fig. 2,.the

Vpartitions l() andll are of uniform width except for relatively shortportions at their adjacent ends, said portions being cut away to form awidening of the corresponding adjacent` slots for the purpose ofaccommodating the loop of yarn as it is drawn toward and into said slotsby the action of the needle in normal operation of the machine. Betweenthese cut away portions of the partitions, the needle has no lateralsupport and therefore depends entirely for guidance upon the contact ofits hook portions with the normally spaced portions of the partitions.

lt will alsobe noted from Fig. l that the slots vary in depth from amaximum considerably deeper than the minimum height of the needle to aminimum which is slightly shallower than the minimum height of the shankof the needle, said minimum depth being adjacent to the cut awayportions of the partitions herein above referred to. At these relativelyvshallow portions of the slots, it will be understood that a needlemight be tilted laterally by action of the web of the fabric tending todraw the end needles toward the center. Ordinarily, where needles areprovided with butts, the possibility of this tilting is eliminated byreason of the leverage exerted by said butts a ainst'the Walls of theguiding partitions.

owever, where there are no butts `on .the needles, it has been foundeffective to make the hooks or terminal parts of the needle of suchnovel shape and proportion with respect to the width, the shank and theguiding slots, that portions of the hooks willA v bear against the wallsof the slot. lhere moving parts are of such relatively small size asthey ordinarily are in a knitting machine, the clearance between aneedle and the sides of its guiding slot' will commonly 2 intense be.001 of an inch or .002 of an inch. ln the case of ordinary needles, thehook portion is usually attenuated in the process of manufacture so thattheclearance between it and the Walls of the guiding partitions is considerably greater that the clearance allowed for the shank and the buttof the needle. In the present case, however, I preferto make the shankand. the hooks .of uniform Width so that the hook may perform a guidingfunction in addi/tion to the thread drawing function. Accordingly,although the slot may be shallow as compared-With the depth of theneedle, it is contemplated that Width of the needle and the of uniformclearance of all the uniform maintenance parts Will operate to hold theneedle in its normal operative position in spite of the pull of thefabric already formed or of any other vreasonable force tending to tiltor displace it from its usual operative position.

Although l have shown my invention as applied only to a straight bedmachine, it is contemplated that the principle embodied in saidinvention ma be applied equally Well to other types o machines such, foreX- ample, as the circular bed type.

claim as my invention:

l. A buttless knitting machine needle having a shank and terminal hooks,portions of the opposed side faces of said hooks being fiat needleguiding surfaces continuous Wit and lying in the plane of thecorresponding opposed side faces of the shank portion.

2. A buttless knitting machine needle having a shank and terminal hooks,portions of the opposed side faces of said hooks being fiat needleguiding' surfaces continuous with and lying in the plane of thecorrespondingl opposed side faces of the shank portion and extendingabove the uppermost surface of the shank.

ln testimony whereof, I name to this specification January, 1919.

WLLIM FELS.

have signed my this 31st day of

